http://msieu-severin.livejournal.com/29609.htmlwhat do you good people think of this?
So I'm in the middle of what is in my opinion the most important work I have ever undertaken, that is working to undermine and close the "tough love" industry. I've been going at this for quite some time now as most of you will appreciate.
Now an interesting thing about this work is that there are an awful lot of very clever people, much smarter people than me also working on it. Phil Elberg for example is a fucking legal genius. I mean the rhetorical whupping he inflicted on Miller "Cassian" Newton was a truly beautiful thing to behold, but ultimately it only cut one head off the hydra and Newton is still free to this day. Then we come to Maia Szalavitz, yet another wonderfully intelligent, articulate person who's book "help at any cost" is a must read for anyone looking for a history and overview of tough love. There's Ginger Warbis who runs the website
http://www.fornits.com there's Alex Koroknay-Palicz, Isabelle Zhender (assuming she's a child advocate today, not an edcon, we can never quite predict. It may be dependant on the lunar cycle.) Shelbie Earnshaw, Wes Fagin, the list of names of brilliant, determined and brave campaigners can really go on and on and on
And between us we are achieving precisely sweet fuck all.
Now being over the far side of the atlantic I've not got much to give except time and money, (little enough of those) so my work has been largely focussed on getting all of the disparate and fractious groups to talk to one another, work together and come up with a unified strategy. No one is playing, erveryone appears to be determined to defend their little fief and frankly it's getting right up my nose. I don't care about who set up what website and whose credibility is on the line. Children are being abused and frankly I think that's more important.
More disheartneing still is this: We in the anti-tough-love movement are losing, badly. The leaders of both American political parties are invested in the process, the war on drugs would grind to a halt without it, enrollment in programs is up to an all time high. Sally Bloody Jesse Raphael and Oprah send kids off to Provo Canyon on live TV to places they will be treated worse than a death row inmate and the audience howls it's agreement. It's sick and depressing and I don't know how to fix it without getting people to work together and invest their resources.
Resources are another problem, ignoring the scope of the industry as a whole, WWASPS on it's own is a ninety two million dollar business with more than two thousand staff, five or more shell corporations and a battery of lawyers that would make Bill Gates weep with envy. The man at the middle of the web is shielded by clever explotation of the articles of incorporation and he retains absolute control over the organisation and it's resources. To go up against a group like that takes money, guts, co-ordination and co-operation. It requires lawyears like Phil Elberg and Alan Medvin who can see past the money settlement and into the court room where the stories of innumerable victims can be told, We require researchers and other men and women of courage to gather up the stories and memories and people who can react to attempts at intimidation with stony indifference.
Most of all though it requires people to work together, to pool information and resources. No one seems willing to do this and that, that alone is why we are losing.
Right now I want to give up and stop trying. I'm not capable of making a difference on my own so why waste the effort.
